Charts – 27 January 2017
Not a very eventful week, but hey, at least there are some new videos!
1. Ed Sheeran – “Shape Of You”
Third week, with “Castle On The Hill” still locked at 2. “Shape Of You” had 56,000 downloads and 9.57 million streams. It’s likely to be here for a while to come. And it has a video now, because that’s the modern way – the video isn’t there to build to the release any more, it’s there to give it a boost once it’s underway.
Holds to Astonish – Mike Quackenbush
As mentioned on our last episode, Paul and I sat down this week to talk with Mike Quackenbush, the creative mind behind the heavily comic book influenced independent wrestling promotion Chikara Pro. We had a great discussion, taking in the upcoming National Pro Wrestling Day; the shifts Mike’s seen in Chikara over the past few years both in terms of the wrestlers they’ve trained and the business and distribution models independent promotions have adopted; the crossover between wrestling and comic books; the 2015 and 2016 Chikara UK tours; their 2013/2014 shutdown angle and accompanying ARG; the ins and outs of IDW’s Revolution and much more besides.
The episode is here, or here on Mixcloud, or you can stream it through the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page. We’ll be back with a regular episode of House to Astonish next week (probably), so keep an eye out for that. And remember, a dog is for life, not just for Christmas, and one of our t-shirts is for a good couple of years at least.
Charts – 20 January 2017
To be honest, it’s a pretty quiet week, now that all the corrections from last week’s recalibration are out of the way. But let’s get it covered anyway.
1. Ed Sheeran – “Shape Of You”
2. Ed Sheeran – “Castle On The Hill”
All-New X-Men #14-16
Mmm. I had it in mind that All-New X-Men #14-16 were a three parter. And re-reading them, they kind of are, but they’re kind of not. This is the tail end of a string of solo stories, which seemed to be on the one hand spotlight time for individual characters, and on the other a gentle subtext of the team falling apart the longer they spend in their new setting.
Issue #14 is basically Scott’s issue, even if Hank is lurking ominously in the background throughout. Scott is still stuck at home with his leg in a cast, going stir crazy. Probably this book’s best feature is Dennis Hopeless’s ability to find a different angle on the characters’ established traits by sticking them in a different context. In Scott’s case, the workaholic obsessiveness that would have made him the X-Men’s ideal leader (or field leader, anyway) needs somewhere else to go, now that the antics of his older self seem to have debarred him from a leadership role.
Charts – 13 January 2017
It is 2017, and Ed Sheeran is upon us.
1. Ed Sheeran – “Shape Of You”
2. Ed Sheeran – “Castle On The Hill”
Yes, new entries at both 1 and 2. What he’s done here, in traditional terms, is to release a Double A-side, but it’s 2016 and so both tracks register separately. We’ve never had simultaneous new entries at number 1 and 2 by the same artist. Mind you, in fairness, not many bands have actually tried releasing two singles simultaneously: in terms of major chart players, you’re pretty much looking at the Manic Street Preachers in 2001 (and they landed at 8 and 9). If you want to be really technical about it, one other act has at least appeared on simultaneous new entries at numbers 1 and 2: George Michael, in 1984. But one of them was “Do They Know It’s Christmas”, so it’s a bit of a special case.
Charts – 6 January 2017
The chart for the week after Christmas is traditionally an oddity; the Christmas singles all disappear, a bunch of tracks getting year-in-review airplay rise to fill the void, and not much else goes on. This year, we have added wrinkle. When streaming data was added to the chart, it raised a new issue for the chart. Instead of just counting sales, there was now a subjective element: how to weight sales against streams? They went for 100 streams = 1 sale. Starting this week, that’s been changed to 150, which tilts the balance somewhat back in the direction of sales (though if streams keep growing, it won’t be long before we’re back where we started).
Is this a more refined view of the respective value of sales and streams (whatever “value” might mean in this context), or just an attempt to get some more movement into the chart, which was unusually sluggish in 2016? Probably the latter, because while the chart is officially there to measure popularity, its unspoken function is to serve as a publicity device; and to do that, it needs people to pay attention; and to get people to pay attention, it needs stuff to happen. But you can make a case that things had become imbalanced: tracks that were selling strongly but lacked streaming support were missing the top 40 altogether.
Old Man Logan #14-15: “Monster War”
So it turns out Old Man Logan isn’t cancelled after all, despite Marvel soliciting issue #18 as “The Epic Conclusion!”, which normally at least means a season break. At least that explains why two issues were given over to this – it might come from the pen of regular writer Jeff Lemire, but it’s got filler written all over it.
A standard set-up for this book is to bring the future Logan into contact with the original supporting cast. And that’s sort of how this one starts off, as Logan investigates the disappearance of Jubilee. Somehow or other the X-Men already know she was last seen in Romania, so Logan goes there and promptly crosses paths with…
All-New X-Men Annual 2016
You’re probably expecting me to tell you that the All-New X-Men Annual is eminently skippable. And I am, but not without some regret.
“Idie Goes On A Date” is a does-what-it-says-on-the-tin story by Sina Grace and Cory Smith. Grace has done things like the slice-of-life memoir Self-Obsessed, which came out through Image in 2015, so he’s an interesting choice for an X-Men annual. What we actually get, as it turns out, is a story where Idie is hanging around at a mall reflecting on how hard it is to escape being an X-Man and just be normal, when she stumbles upon a nice boy and they wind up going on a date. (more…)
Charts – 30 December 2016
House to Astonish Episode 151
It’s the end of the year, and as always, we’re running through the results of the Homies awards, with Paul’s picks, my picks, and the winners of the listener vote. We’ve got unexpectedly good books, predictably good creators, astonishingly close votes, and shambolically tabulated results. Come hear what we enjoyed this year, and what the voting Housemates plumped for. All this plus a wooden piece of wood, a beautiful leather briefcase, and a perfunctory log fire.
The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. As always, let us know what you think, in the comments, on Twitter, by email or on our Facebook fan page. And hey, it’s nearly a new year, so time for a new look – why not treat yourself to a House to Astonish shirt from our Redbubble store?
